I know many of you maybe wondering why I was in the hospital and had to have surgery. Well the doctors were concerned that I was developing a "male cancer." I discovered that in the western mind that is the polite way of saying "your testes and lower regions are going to hurt like hell post-exploratory surgery, and your genitals will look like Chinese eggplants for several weeks." On top of that, from the surgery I had a minor infection, fever and needed antibiotics as well as many many painkillers. I am on some now. I just want to make it clear I do not have penis retraction syndrome, or Koro , brought on by the belief that foreign women are really witches who have stolen my penis and I did not see the beautiful Hu Li Jung or Fox Spirit who is known to steal the male penis: Penis panics in southeast Asia have become known under the term "Koro" (which means " head of the turtle " in Malay). Some anthropologists have referred to Koro as a culture...

I have a weak spot for the sea. I have always lived near the sea and love the people who live on it. When I was a boy, my grandfather told me stories of the four great Queens who ruled a pirate kingdom in Thailand. I came to love the Queens of Pattani in Southern Thailand through his stories; during Pattani's golden age the reign of its four successive queens from 1584,were known as Raja Hijau (The Green Queen), Raja Biru (The Blue Queen), Raja Ungu (The Purple Queen) and Raja Kuning (The Yellow Queen), where the kingdom's economic and military strength was greatly increased to the point that it was able to fight off four major Siamese invasions with the help of the eastern Malay kingdom of Pahang and the southern Malay Sultanate of Johore. After the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767 to the forces of Burma, King Taksin asked for military assistance from Pattani against Burma but the Sultan did not send help to him. After the founding of the Chakri dynasty Rama I sent Prince Surasi to p...

Well we do, and while Pavin Chachavalpongpun offers reasons why Thailand's new "war on drugs" may result in disaster below, it is important to note that as of 2006 in the United States "according to the American Corrections Association, the average daily cost per state prison inmate per day in the US is $67.55. State prisons held 249,400 inmates for drug offenses in 2006. That means it cost states approximately $16,846,970 per day to imprison drug offenders, or $6,149,144,050 per year." These non-violent drug offenders often are forced into violence by prison life and "department of corrections data show that about a fourth of those initially imprisoned for nonviolent crimes are sentenced for a second time for committing a violent offense. Whatever else it reflects, this pattern highlights the possibility that prison serves to transmit violent habits and values rather than to reduce them." This profoundly disturbing fact is matched by much more distu...

For those of you who cannot keep up with our blog whose posts move faster than the Nasdaq ticker, I wrote an article about the potential benefits and drawbacks of poverty or favela tourism and while it seems a little brave new worldish, it can have its benefits for the very poorest people in the world. There is a controversy over the practice in Thailand, but from a strictly libertarian perspective, exposing the rich to the discomfort of poverty can be a cause for philanthropy as it should be . I appreciate the criticisms of the Europeans, but would like to ask them to ask their businessmen and governments, just as I ask American business people and the government-frequently- what have you done to help the poor in this country or Thailand, or Bolivia, or Latin America, or the former Soviet Union lately? Taste of poverty for the rich: Thai hotel stirs controversy over lavish feast By Jocelyn Gecker ASSOCIATED PRESS 7:47 a.m. April 5, 2008 BANGKOK, Thailand – A Bangkok luxury hotel trea...

The delicacy known as Plaa Raa , or fermented fish, is the number one culprit for mild stomach illness in South East Asia. No one is immune from its effects- I have indulged in it and it is not surprising I fully understand the words "stayed home from work with an upset stomach" in the news announcement below and why these maybe the most common words in the Thai lexicon for every person with epicurean tendencies. Even the Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej is sick today from plaa raa or the flu . And while it is unlikely that Mr. Sundaravej got sick on his trip to Laos, it is much more likely he got a flu during this wet time of year , it is still worth noting that most people in northern and north eastern Thailand love plaa raa and eat it as a staple food. They even have a fermented fish village where the villagers make a good living making plaa raa and fish sauce. If you travel there, please make sure when you get green papaya salad you ask for Sam Tam Farang , NOT Sam...

h/t to Stuff Asian People Like for this: http://www.asian-central.com/stuffasianpeoplelike/2008/03/05/25-staring-at-people/

I was going to post something about gay and lesbian rights in Thailand, but, these posts pretty much say it all....from the actual movement toward freedom and rights for lesbian women to the vulgar, these posts really do say it all.... http://www.isiswomen.org/wia/wia398/soc00007.html http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3693/is_199903/ai_n8852028 http://www.mangosauce.com/farang_life/farang_lesbian_lust_thailand.php If you take the time to read through them, you will see I do not have anything to add.

"Even if they should smash statues and burn scriptures, it would be wrong of me to carry anger in my heart or offense in my head, as the Buddha suffered through innumerable hardships, so too must I bear patiently these things, heat and wind, cold and rain, ignorant people and anger of others. All things arise a result of conditions, I did not condition them, but I will cherish all living beings within them." --Buddhist Prayer, translated from Pali Thailand plans to censor you and your site if you offend the Buddha. This raises a number of troubling questions about the use of the Internet to control how information is used, about the dynamics of our first amendment rights online and our willingness to defend them. Of course most Americans do not want to cause any offense to anyone, but often do so through sheer ignorance of the historical conditions people are sensitive to; sometimes people do so willingly, but for many Americans tolerance is an ideal as enshrined as it is for...